How To Buy A Leather Motorcycle Suit If this is the first time you've been in the market for a leather motorcycle riding suit, or jacket for that matter, you are likely going into the experience with little information and lots of questions. Looking for a perfect Biker Leather Jacket? Visit Leather Jackets India A one or two piece leather suit is generally a relatively significant investment for most riders. The cost alone is the reason so many riders don't own a suit, let alone a good quality jacket. It's safe to say that a majority of street motorcycle riders ride with less than ideal riding gear. Given that fact, riding with any real protective gear other than a helmet is a step above the rest. Nevertheless, our opinion is that you should own and use the best quality riding gear that you can afford. Beyond that, your gear should fit your needs, your riding style and most of all it will fit you.
We are often asked what the difference is between the low end and high-end suits. It comes down to the number of features the suit has, the quality of the leather, the quality of the interior of the suit, the quality of the armor (if the suit features any), the sort and amount of stitching in the suit. The more expensive the materials and the more time needed to make the suit will make up the cost of the suit. Like anything, you tend to get what you pay for and poorly made suits will not only protect you less but won't last as long just during the regular use of the suit.
Features to look for in a suit include: * Leather type, either cowhide, kangaroo or goat * Leather thickness and suit weight * Type of venting and perforation features * Type of protection and padding * Type of spine protection, aero hump, or inserts * Slider type and hardness * Quantity and Type of stitching * Internal lining, removability * Insert pockets or snap-ins for back protectors * Stretch material used The first thing you need to understand about motorcycle protective gear is that leather, whether cowhide or kangaroo skin, is always more protective than any type of textile (fabric) material currently available. Leather motorcycle gear is lightweight and therefore comfortable, easy to get in and out of and breaths well, but there is a reason that no pro or amateur racer today is using textile gear on the track. Textile suits and jackets do not protect riders along with leather in a crash. Today's suit manufacturers do use textile materials in parts of the suit that rarely experience impact or stress, such as under the arms, the groin and of course in the lining of a suit. The qualities of leather make it a very difficult material to burn or tear in a crash slide situation. This isn't to say that textile jackets and pants shouldn't be owned and used for
regular street riding, but of the two, leather offers more protection. Various types of leather and a wide range of leather thickness is used across all manufacturers. It is possible to really look at a leather suit as a 2nd, very thick skin, that is worn over your body. Sewn into this skin, in any serious leather suit, will be protective strategically placed armor for even more protection and then stretch panels and liners for comfort and cooling. In a crash situation, the leather protects from impact force that would otherwise tear your skin and slide abrasion that would otherwise scrape your skin off. Impact armor is there to absorb as much of impact energy as possible. Higher end leather tends to be thinner and soft, therefore lighter and more comfortable for the rider, than heavy-weight leather. Thin, soft leather also takes less time for the suit to break-in than heavy-weight leather. Thin leather, taken to the extreme could be comfortable, but may also no more be fully protective, or if it is, is only a 'one-crash' garment. Leather suits are typically offered in "one piece" and "two-piece" varieties. One piece suits provide the best protection of the two types, due to the fact that there are fewer seams that can be subject to tearing during an impact situation. A two-piece suit is slightly more versatile than a one-piece suit, A two-piece suit is more versatile than compared to a one-piece suit slightly, since it can be unzipped at the waist and be ridden as a jacket alone. The topic of armor. Body armor is the area of the suit designed to protect the rider's body from a hard impact with the ground or other objects. Many leather riding jackets on the market today have no body armor in them at all. The other important part of a jacket or suit is the impact absorbing armor. Higher end suits today use "CE Approved" hard plastic and/or multi-layered memory foam armor inserts at these impact areas. Utilizing hard armor and various types of foam and padding, creates an energy absorbing zone throughout the suit, protecting the rider during heavy direct impact crashes.
Protection zones to look at include: * Shoulders * Elbows * Spine * Hips * Knees * Shins * Chest * Thighs The bare-bones distinction between a high-quality suit and low-quality suit can be said to be the quality of the leather and the quality of the stitching. A high-quality well-made suit can withstand the most brutal of slides and still stay together, protecting the rider's skin. Lessor quality leather matched with poor stitching is what causes a suit to 'blow up', or break on a rider during a crash. It takes a certain amount of skill, learned proprietary knowledge and craft to produce a suit will live up to the task. Next to protection, what any suit or jacket spends most of its time doing is keeping you comfortable. Mainly, this means that you should be fitted by the suit well so that you would want to wear it. An overly heavy suit with no venting on a hot day, won't be your first choice when you go to suit up for a day's ride in the street. An overly uncomfortable suit will also have the effect of being a distraction to your riding when you are on the bike. You want your suit to fit as good as possible. Another important point to consider is that there is a multitude of suit manufacturers on the market today. A good amount of them utilizes the racing scene as a marketing and sales tool for their products. It makes good sense to look at which riders are riding with what suit brand because these guys have careers and lives to protect and they crash all of the right time. They want to be around at the finish line but realize too, that pro racers will often have custom suits built for them by their sponsors. What your favorite pro racer is wearing may or may not be available to the average rider. Suit makers also use their sponsored riders for product testing and product development. Many of the suits worn by pro racers are not yet available to the public, because the manufacturer puts time, money and energy into getting feedback from their sponsored
riders for products that are not yet released yet. This information is then taken back to the lab and used to build next-generation protection products.